On Friday, May 17, 2019, I finally realized, just how much distress I feel, as Trump and his henchmen destroy the democracy, I was raised to believe in, and in time discovered was flawed, but at the same time was salvageable. On Friday, May 17, 2019, I awoke from a restless night of no sleep with horrible pain in my gut. I recognized that particular pain, the feeling of emptiness, the sense of abandonment, the awareness that good no longer mattered, but was replaced with an evil so insidious, yet lurking in the corners as if, hidden. It was the same feeling that oozed over my entire soul the day I publicly came out as a Gay Man, as if, coming out was some kind of sin. The sense of shame I had at the time, a combination of my own insecurities and the culmination of the society in which I lived consumed me to the point where I thought I needed to leave my home of Pittsburgh, and my children, to make things right. I was a fool, on a fool’s errand, but it was all I knew or could consider! I honestly knew there was nothing wrong with me, but I reacted in retreat and permitted the assumed enemy take over my own power, and I moved away! I still see a psychiatrist regarding those days, but she and I have come to a conclusion that all of the guilt and angst, was self-imposed, and I am not the person I thought the community would think of me. But at that time in my life, my GUT hurt, that place in my body where my ribs meet my lungs and my lungs touch my heart. It was an awful pain, and it took dozens of years to finally STOP. I was right and I was being wronged in my perception of the community around me. I perseverated, ruminated and rotted inside far too long. My parents taught me right from wrong, good from bad, I knew the truth, but felt, at the time, too weak to fight the battle and win!
On Friday, May 17, 2019, that same hurt, that same pain, that same uncomforting feeling, laid heavy in my GUT. I realized that this nation was becoming a victim, a self-permitted victim of men and women who delight in deception, who delve into decay and demolition of democracy. And I FEEL STRONGLY, I must never let this notion of someone else defining my life be the norm. I am, among the many attributes a Gay Man, I am, among the many attributes an American man…I will not run away from MY truth ever again, and I URGE all Americans, to smack themselves in their heads and understand, we are on the precipice of the end of democracy, equality, and freedom. We, ALL must RESIST and if necessary REVOLT. Trump wants us to be ashamed of who we are…denigrate us, divide us. My GUT is beginning to hurt again, and I will NEVER, EVER let that happen. No more battles to run from, just to face and win!
